How long does it take for you to prepare for a meeting?
If you have been working in an office for the longest time, and you know you will attend a meeting, maybe it’ll take a couple of minutes to touch up your make-up and be ready.
It’s because you are already wearing your business attire and would most likely already have a place to set up your meeting. But since the pandemic, most of the employees have been requested to work from home.
Are you one of them?
If so, then you would know how things work when it comes to company meetings.
Working from home has its perks. You can wake up and brush your teeth, fix yourself a little bit and log in. You can even have your breakfast while working – in your pajamas!
That’s awesome, right?
However, when it’s time to attend your weekly meeting, you must, of course, be prepared to be at your best, and working from home will come with challenges.
Good thing there are video calling applications such as zoom that make it very easy for us to have online meetings, but since most of us are new to this, there are things that we still can’t seem to fix.
We all want to look our best when we’re on a video call meeting, right? But, truth is, it’s a bit hard to find the best and most flattering angle.
Good thing there are easy-to-follow and effective things that we can practice to be at our best when we’re attending our work-from-home meetings.
So be ready to be at your best when you follow these simple steps:
Find the most flattering light source
One of the most common setbacks with online meetings is when you don’t have proper lighting.
Avoid having your light source at your back, on your side, or even above you.
These settings will make you look gloomy and will cast shadows on your face. We also don’t want you to be facing away from the light source.
The best light is a soft, steady natural light coming from a window. If you have windows in your home, that would be great.
If you are using your phone, try to walk around your home to find the best lighting. If you have a home office, then you can switch to a ring light along with your room or natural light.
Remember, no sidelight or backlight, and don’t sit too close to the light source as well because that would overdo it.
Find your most flattering camera angle
What’s next is to look for your most flattering camera angle. Again, this is one of the top issues when we are having zoom meetings.
According to Angela Wright, owner of YouTube channel HotandFlashy, the worst camera angle is from below, and we agree to this.
We wouldn’t want all our teammates to see that angle. It will only focus on your double chin, neck wrinkles (yes, those are real), and your face shadow.
Also, don’t look too close to the camera to avoid a wide-face angle that isn’t flattering at all.
What you want to achieve is to look slightly up into your camera. Again, not too high up, we don’t want to overdo it. Go for a little height, just enough for your posture to be straight and for you to lift your chin.
Put a little effort into your hair and makeup
Now that you have the proper lighting and camera position, this will make the camera properly focus on your face. That’s a great start.
What’s next is for you to put a little effort into your hair and makeup, just like what you used to do when you are still going to the office.
Don’t overdo it by going full glam. We don’t want to distract everyone, right?
You can start with neatly combed hair and fresh makeup. Angela even created a video about beautiful stay-at-home makeup here.
Go for fresh and subtle makeup that will be pleasant and will make you look radiant.
Avoid too much distraction
Transitioning to work from home can be quite an adjustment. Unless you have an extra room to serve as your office, it’s hard to find a spot that is only dedicated to your work.
This is the reason why so many online meetings have distractions. When we say distractions, it can be any of the following:
- Messy background
- Kids and pets who constantly run and play
- Sound distractions like pets, someone cooking, or even working machines
- Even you, being conscious of your appearance can be a distraction
- Habits such as playing with your hair or checking out your nails
- Eating or snacking
Now, these can all distract your teammates, and we don’t want that. So start with yourself. Avoid habits like picking your nose, ears, biting nails, snacking, and even being too conscious.
Try to focus and look into the lens.
For messy background distractions, we understand that we can’t always have clean and tidy homes, but if you can’t have a home office, at least, set a spot that can be your workspace.
Just make sure that this spot is clean and meeting-ready.
This will help you a lot, especially when you have urgent meetings. We don’t want to stress out and start cleaning everything all at the same time, right?
You can also invest in a quality noise-canceling headset to avoid those loud noises.
Dress properly and comfortably
Lastly, dress accordingly but comfortably. We are not saying that you should wear your uniform or business-casual attire when you are at home, but please do dress up when you are in a meeting.
No one wants to see you wearing your pajamas or your hoodie in a meeting.
It’s even okay if your top won’t match your bottom clothes. If you are wearing a blouse for your meeting, but you are also still in your pajamas below – that’s okay.
Just make sure that you have everything you need so that you won’t have to stand up and show everyone your mismatched attire.
While we are in this situation, let’s enjoy the perks of working from home. But along with this, it’s still nice to be professional-looking when we are in a meeting.
By following these amazing tips from Angela, we would be able to have more confidence when we are in a meeting, and we would look good.
Watch the full clip here, and don’t forget to share this with your coworkers and friends.
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